25th Anniversary of Destruction: USSR Breakup and its Fallout

Today, December 8, 2016, the world marks 25th anniversary of the event the vast majority of the Russian World considers a tragic date. On December 8, 1991 leaders of three Slavic Soviet Republics, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, called the Three Sisters, signed the infamous Belovezhskaya Pushcha Accords, which effectively dissolved the USSR, establishing instead the still-born Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The accords sanctified what Putin later called ‘the largest humanitarian catastrophe of the second half of the 20th century.’

The internet, Russian and post-Soviet media have been flooded with various videos and articles, which explain and judge, from their point of view, the events of that day. Many still try to come to terms and understand what happened; many have condemned this day and those who signed the breakup: Russian SSR head Boris Yeltsin, Ukrainian SSR head Shevchuk and Belorussian SSR head Shushkevich.